closing down for the winter

Four days since I arrived and I have a feeling I'm not going to want to leave this place at the end of the week. The group of fellow workers I have landed amongst include two French, two German, one New Zealander, two Americans and three fellow Brits - lovely all! So far we have taken down the staff tents, done lots of gardening, and begun the packing away that signals the end of the season here at Kalikalos. The yurt is staying up for a few more days and is coming in useful for sleeping in, and impromptu 'quiet time' or massage sessions. The ducks have still been unsuccessful at flying - despite the best attempts of helpful humans to assist them in their aerial endeavours...
The food here has been excellent and I only wish I had signed up for MORE shifts in the kitchen as it is such fun working alongside the people here to create something with love. Lunch today was much appreciated after some physical work in the garden, digging and raking.
Tonight we are being treated to a meal at our sister centre Anilios, where we worked this morning on the land, creating a large raised bed for growing vegetables, knocking down a wall in the main house to create a bigger room, and various other little jobs that needed doing.
Tomorrow is 'Taverna Night' and we will probably eat in the village of Kissos so we can walk home afterwards. Whether the meal will be as tasty as we could create in the kitchen here remains to be seen, but it will be nice to be 'out and about' sampling the local vegetarian Greek dishes. Bean stew perhaps?
Off to Anilio, kalispera!
Catherine, Brighton UK

The Ducks at Kalikalos

We have two ducks at Kalikalos.  Their names are Snowy and Wooly. Snowy is the smaller one who we think is female and Wooly is the larger one who we think is male. The are about two months old but they have been expanding at a rapid pace and they already look like adult ducks. They have not made quack noises as yet but they do make little squeeky noises when they get fed or let out of their enclosure as you see in the photo with me as babysitter. They have a little bath in their pen which they enjoy floating around in and preening their feathers.

 The ducks are beautiful to watch and instill a sense of presence in me when I'm with them. They are peaceful, sweet, gentle and have beautiful white feathers. The white feathers capture a gorgeous creamy light and the feathers make a gentle rustling noise when they are preened.
 I would like to take them home hidden under both arms through the airport customs. 

Jeanette, Leeds, England

Kalikalos 2010 Photos

I finally managed to set up my photoalbum with some Kalikalos pics and put it online.
You can view at the "public selection" here:

http://fotoalbum.web.de/gast/shako/Holiday_at_Kalikalos

Password is "kalikalos"




Shako Berkhardt, Berlin

Tango nights at Kalikalos

  
  We were having fun during all the summer with improvised tango classes after dinner. Almost every week I had the chance to share some basic steps for all the new "tangueros" joining me. It was great fun for me to do this. In this pictures I am with Mandy, burning the patio's floor of Kaliklalos. 

                                                                 
                                                                   Hernan from Argentina. 

Writting in the rain at Kalikalos

on saturday 11th september it rained all day ..what better way to spend the afternoon than gathering in a tiny circle with a few candles and open our hearts to the sound of rain pelting onto the round tent space. this is used for all sorts of activities from yoga in the early morning to the morning sharing circles and more. despite of and thanks to the rain ,we wrote and wrote and  finally we entered a poetry field  and were inspired by the sufi poet rumi, mary oliver, rainer maria rilke and other kindred spirits of the past .

let me share with you what came to us

          and in this silence there is so much
          and when i open the door i will only see the light
          and i will say welcome home
          shine into every corner and spear nothing
          and when the rain falls
          i will say welcome
          your tears and mine are of the same sort
         and when i kneel down on the earth
         she will s say' welcome my child, you have returned at last'
         and so one by one all will fall into its rightful place
         and no one and no thing will be spared
         only gratitude will remain
         for this being alive in a space of no return and nothing

        and here is another voice

        can  i rest?
        let it be
        let it go
        is there anything at all that can be known?
        or is it gone and already lost
        the moment it is seen
       am i feeling this tired
       because i keep holding on
       to fleeting times and worries of the past
       i am feeling so light
       as a leaf in the wind
       moving this pen\
       on a white paper sheet
       some writing appears
       it is very sweet

       and here one example of a poem which brought together all our voice:s, a group poem:

       i will only see the light,
       your hand,that so round
       is moving this pen,
       writing appears....
       is there anything at all that can be known
       i learned about tone and falsetto
       and only gratitude remains

       and then it got dark and the rain would not stop pelting, thunder and lightening, the elemts roaring in the
       greek mountains, we felt softened and at one for that tiny moment in time and the bell for the evening
       meal summoned us around  the tables  for the evening meal and other business.
       i knew again how much i love to create these 'soul writing spaces' like hardly any other because they are 
      a reminder that we are one  and that all that which is so much talked and theorised about is  true
      indeed if given time and made space for.

      bettina peterseil from kalikalos in the pelion mountains
         

.

Pears, Sun and Swimming

Well, woke up today to a beautiful sunrise over the Aegean Sea. It was only 7.00am , but the air was warm and it was completely silent. I could not resist standing for a few minutes to watch the sun rise!

However, I was preparing breakfast, and with 25 hungry people about to wake up and want some food after their Tai Chi Shibashi, I went to the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea before cooking.

Breakfast was fresh fruit, with greek yoghurt! I am not sure how the Greeks do it, but their yoghurt is amazing! It is always nice to sit outside and have breakfast with the staff, guests and workshop participants! This week we have Satsang with Gaia and Venu.  After breakfast we had the staff attunement and meeting where we decided to harvest our pears. The centre here has 2 big peae trees which have been dropping pears for a couple of weeks. It required a team of people - one to climb the ladder and shake the tree, and two to run around under catching the pears with blankets!

We harvested quite a few pears this way and were able to enjoy them for lunch!

After lunch we all piled into our wee micras, or walked down to the beach and enjoyed a refreshing swim and time to sunbathe!

Then tonight some people went to spiritual dancing and music, before we all head down to the local Taverna in Kissos for dinner.

Once again I feel so lucky to be here at Kalikalos, with great people, beautiful scenery and enjoying living in lovely community!

Pizza Night at Kalikalos

For 2 weeks now I have wanted to make pizza in the woodfire oven here at Kalikalos. Eventually on Thursday night I found a group of people who were keen to try and cook pizza. We came home early from the beach in order to get started !
Since none of us had ever cooked using an oven like this before, we had to refer to YouTube in order to find out how it worked!

To start, a couple of hours before you want to cook in the oven, you need to build a good fire in the oven so that the stones get hot enough to cook the pizza on! After the fire has burnt down, you push the hot embers aside and then the bottom of the oven is hot enough to cook on (this is a simplified version)! We made our own pizza dough and then put on a range of toppings including local olives, tomatoes and goats cheese (which was made by a man down the road just 3 days ago)!

When the pizzas were ready to be cooked we carried them over to the oven, and then had to figure out how to get them in the oven. This proved harder then first thought ...someone had to hold a torch so that we could see what we were doing while someone had to try and slide the pizza in! What we did not realize prior to this, was that the base of the oven was quite uneven, which made it quite difficult to slide the pizza into the oven and remove it once cooked. A couple of times it looked like our nice toppings would slide into the oven without the pizza base, and we only just rescued it in time! However, after 4 hours, we had a fine selection of pizzas, in various shapes and sizes, but all tasted amazing!

There is something about eating food that has been cooked outside, and it was great to cook with such a nice group of people! Coming from New Zealand, it was pretty magic to be able to sit outside, under a kiwifruit vine, drinking local Retsina and eating our pizza!

Jessica Zanetti
New Zealand